Teacher in Queens Sends Graphic Emails to Students: DA

If the allegations against him prove true, then Umesh Ramjattan is a teacher whose creepiness is only exceeded by his stupidity. Ramjattan, an English teacher at MS 137 in Ozone Park, gave his students his email address for homework help and questions, Queens DA Richard Brown said. But the 22-year-old rookie teacher had more than homework help on his mind and made inappropriate email contact with three 12-year-old students, the DA said.

Once he started emailing with one student from his gmail account, Ramjattan then used Yahoo and Aol accounts to send emails of a "personal and suggestive" nature, the DA said. On October 3, he sent that same student a video of him having sex with his girlfriend. He also harassed two other 12-year-olds, authorities said.

The full release from the Queens DA after the jump:

From the Queens DA:

Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown announced today that an English teacher at a middle school in the South Ozone Park section of Queens has been charged with sending sexual videos and electronic messages to three of his 12-year-old female students.

District Attorney Brown said, “The defendant, who just began his teaching career last month, is accused of providing his students with an e-mail address to which they could contact him with questions about their schoolwork and then turning around and using their e-mail addresses to send indecent messages and pictures to them. This case should serve as a clear and unmistakable warning that law enforcement is prepared to apprehend and prosecute sexual predators who betray and defile youngsters.”

The District Attorney identified the defendant as Umesh Ramjattan, 22, of 91-71 115th Street in Richmond Hill, Queens. Ramjattan, a first-year teacher at MS 137 in Ozone Park, is presently being held pending arraignment in Queens Criminal Court in Kew Gardens on charges of Disseminating Indecent Material to Minors in the First Degree and Endangering the Welfare of a Child. If convicted, he faces up to seven years in prison.

District Attorney Brown said that, according to the charges, one of Ramjattan’s female seventh-grade students sent an e-mail on September 29, 2007 to the e-mail address the defendant had provided the class (mrramjattan@gmail.com) to ask him a question about school work. Soon thereafter, it is alleged that Ramjattan began instant messaging her from the screen name mrramjattan1@aol.com with questions that were both sexually suggestive and of a personal nature and that, on October 3, 2007, he sent her (via e-mail from umeshr85@yahoo.com) a video of him and his girlfriend having sexual intercourse. It is further charged that a second female student who e-mailed the defendant about her homework began receiving instant messages from him through his AOL account on September 29, 2007, that contained questions of a personal nature and that, sometime in early October, she received a picture of the defendant where he was not wearing a shirt. Finally, it is alleged that a third female student who e-mailed the defendant for help with her homework began receiving instant messages from the defendant through his AOL account that were both personal and sexual in nature.

District Attorney Brown said that and investigation began when the parents of one of the students notified school authorities that Ramjattan had e-mailed a sexual video to their daughter and the school, in turn, notified the police.

The defendant was arrested yesterday and, in statements allegedly made to police, admitted to having inappropriate instant message conversations with the three young victims and sending the video and images of himself but that he only did it after school.

The investigation was conducted by Detectives Donna Garrison and Owen Soba of the NYPD’s Computer Crimes Squad under the supervision of Lieutenant Dennis Lane and the overall supervision of Chief Jeremiah Quinlan.

Senior Assistant District Attorney Kateri A. Gasper is prosecuting the case under the supervision of Robert D. Alexander, Chief of the District Attorney’s Computer Crimes Unit, and Anthony M. Communiello, Bureau Chief of the District Attorney’s Special Proceedings Bureau, and Oscar W. Ruiz, Deputy Bureau Chief, and the overall supervision of Executive Assistant District Attorney for Investigations Peter A. Crusco and Deputy Executive Assistant District Attorney for Investigations Linda M. Cantoni.

It should be noted that a criminal complaint is merely an accusation and that a defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty.